14752 20260320_100918 Deco doorway on a plain house

iain.davidson100 has added a photo to the pool:

14752 20260320_100918 Deco doorway on a plain house

14751 20260320_100819 Virginia Creeper

iain.davidson100 has added a photo to the pool:

14751 20260320_100819 Virginia Creeper

14750 20260320_100734 Virginia Creeper

iain.davidson100 has added a photo to the pool:

14750 20260320_100734 Virginia Creeper

The Guardian

Latest news, sport, business, comment, analysis and reviews from the Guardian, the world's leading liberal voice

Seven-year-old Canadian girl with autism and mother detained by ICE in Texas

Mother and child held in notorious Rio Grande Valley detention centre despite presenting visa, family says

A Canadian mother and her seven-year-old daughter, who has autism, have been detained by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in Texas since Saturday, family members have said.

Relatives of Tania Warner and her daughter Ayla Lucas say they were detained unlawfully. They are uncertain about what problem ICE found with their immigration paperwork.

Continue reading...

Premier League and Carabao Cup: things to look out for this weekend

Igor Thiago looms over Leeds, Newcastle need to bounce back from Barça and Viktor Gyökeres aims for hero status

Though Manchester United continued to win after playing brilliantly against Manchester City and Arsenal in Michael Carrick’s first two games as manager, the quality and coherence of their performances decreased thereafter. Lacking balance without the injured Patrick Dorgu, they’ve been rescued on three separate occasion by Benjamin Sesko’s goals – goals which eventually forced him into the team at the expense of Amad Diallo. But though Amad is easier to omit than Bryan Mbeumo and Matheus Cunha, both of whom are older, dearer and more productive, without him United lacked a dribbler: a player eager to run at opponents, who isn’t necessarily seeking the quickest route to goal, and whose quick feet in tight spaces are invaluable against disciplined defences. It is no coincidence that on his return to the starting XI, against Villa last weekend, United delivered their best display since those early weeks. Though, at some point soon, Sesko’s form will again demand his inclusion, this time it is unlikely to be Amad who makes way. Daniel Harris

Bournemouth v Manchester United, Friday 8pm

Brighton v Liverpool, Saturday 12.30pm

Fulham v Burnley, Saturday 3pm

Everton v Chelsea, Saturday 5.30pm

Leeds v Brentford, Saturday 8pm

Newcastle v Sunderland, Sunday 12pm

Continue reading...

AC/DC guitarist Stevie Young hospitalised ahead of Buenos Aires concerts

Young undergoing medical tests but ‘in good spirits’ and expected to perform, says events promoter

AC/DC guitarist Stevie Young has been hospitalised in Buenos Aires after feeling unwell, just days before the band’s scheduled sold-out concerts in the city.

According to the event’s promoter, the guitarist for the legendary Australian rock band was undergoing medical tests but remains in good spirits and was expected to perform.

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Georgia woman charged with murder after police say she took pills to induce abortion

If prosecuted, case against 31-year-old would be one of first in Georgia since it passed 2019 law banning most abortions

A 31-year-old Georgia woman has been charged with murder by police who say she took pills to induce an illegal abortion.

If state prosecutors decide to move forward with the murder charge brought by local police against Alexia Moore, her case would be one of the first instances of a woman being charged for terminating a pregnancy in Georgia since it passed a 2019 law banning most abortions.

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EU leaders vow to support Cyprus in talks over future of British bases

Akrotiri and Dhekelia bases have become targets for Iran after outbreak of Middle East crisis

EU leaders have pledged to stand behind Cyprus as it seeks “an open and frank discussion” on the future of the British bases on the island, which have become a target after the outbreak of the latest Middle East crisis.

Ahead of an EU summit on Thursday, Cyprus’s president, Nikos Christodoulides, said he wanted “an open and frank discussion with the British government” regarding the status and future of the British bases on the island.

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I’m tired of always paying for my friends on nights out. What can I do about it? | Leading questions

We all see money differently, writes advice columnist Eleanor Gordon-Smith. If you want your friends to see it your way, you’ll have to communicate it

I’m a university student with a good part-time job. I make about $250 a fortnight and I have always been taught how to look after my money and save responsibly. My two closest friends are both unemployed, but by choice. No matter how much I help them apply for jobs, they never do.

I often go out on the weekends drinking or partying, where naturally I spend money on alcohol, maybe some food and an Uber ride home.

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Lampenwinkel

In een lampenwinkel zie ik de verkoper staan en vraag me af hoe iemand erop komt een lampenwinkel te beginnen.

Last Stop

Greg Adams Photography posted a photo:

Last Stop

Trolley Graveyard

Old rusty trains and trolleys fading away in a forest in Central Pennsylvania. I first visited this amazing place with an Abandoned America workshop in 2014. The trains were rusty by otherwise is great shop.

When I next visited vandals had destroyed most of the trains, broke the windows, stripped out any potentially valuable copper wire and covered the trains in graffiti.

More recent photos are in the attached album. I prefer to remember this place as a magical version of forgotten trains frozen in time in the woods.

www.flickr.com/photos/gregadams/albums/72157648252345989/

Found Kodachrome Slide

Thomas Hawk posted a photo:

Found Kodachrome Slide

date stamped on slide December 1980

Tangled Up With Mexico

Thomas Hawk posted a photo:

Tangled Up With Mexico

Slashdot

News for nerds, stuff that matters

4Chan Mocks $700K Fine For UK Online Safety Breaches

The UK regulator Ofcom fined 4chan nearly $700,000 (520,000 pounds) for failing to implement age checks and address illegal content risks under the Online Safety Act, but the platform mocked the penalty and signaled it won't pay. A lawyer representing the company responded with an AI-generated cartoon image of a hamster, writing in a follow-up post on X: "In the only country in which 4chan operates, the United States, it is breaking no law and indeed its conduct is expressly protected by the First Amendment." The BBC reports: The fines also include 50,000 pounds for failing to assess the risk of illegal material being published and a further 20,000 pounds for failing to set out how it protects users from criminal content. 4Chan has refused to pay all previous fines from Ofcom. "Companies -- wherever they're based -- are not allowed to sell unsafe toys to children in the UK. And society has long protected youngsters from things like alcohol, smoking and gambling. The digital world should be no different," said Ofcom's Suzanne Cater. "The UK is setting new standards for online safety. Age checks and risk assessments are cornerstones of our laws, and we'll take robust enforcement action against firms that fall short."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Rogue AI Triggers Serious Security Incident At Meta

For the second time in the past month, an AI agent went rogue at Meta -- this time giving an engineer incorrect advice that briefly exposed sensitive data. The Verge reports: A Meta engineer was using an internal AI agent, which Clayton described as "similar in nature to OpenClaw within a secure development environment," to analyze a technical question another employee posted on an internal company forum. But the agent also independently publicly replied to the question after analyzing it, without getting approval first. The reply was only meant to be shown to the employee who requested it, not posted publicly. An employee then acted on the AI's advice, which "provided inaccurate information" that led to a "SEV1" level security incident, the second-highest severity rating Meta uses. The incident temporarily allowed employees to access sensitive data they were not authorized to view, but the issue has since been resolved.

According to Clayton, the AI agent involved didn't take any technical action itself, beyond posting inaccurate technical advice, something a human could have also done. A human, however, might have done further testing and made a more complete judgment call before sharing the information -- and it's not clear whether the employee who originally prompted the answer planned to post it publicly. "The employee interacting with the system was fully aware that they were communicating with an automated bot. This was indicated by a disclaimer noted in the footer and by the employee's own reply on that thread," Clayton commented to The Verge. "The agent took no action aside from providing a response to a question. Had the engineer that acted on that known better, or did other checks, this would have been avoided."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The Register

Biting the hand that feeds IT — Enterprise Technology News and Analysis

Decoding Nvidia's Groq-powered LPX and the rest of its new rack systems

From LPUs and GPUs to CPUs and switches, everything you need to know about Nvidia's latest kit

GTC DEEP DIVE  At Nvidia’s GTC conference this week, CEO Jensen Huang finally addressed a $20 billion question he’s dodged for months: Why spend so much to license AI chip startup Groq’s tech and hire away its engineers rather than build it themselves?…

Suspension Bridges of Disbelief, part 2

VFX artists vs. The Golden Gate:

McMurry recalls plenty of discussion about adhering to any 'real' physics if that event actually happened. "There was a very fun debate about what would happen if the center broke. Some people said, 'Well, these towers, since they're under stress, they would just go immediately back out this way.' We did some tests but then we said, 'Well, that looks stupid.'" [...]

"We were always scaling things up and down, cheating gravity stronger or weaker, just to make everything feel like it had the right scale but wasn't too slow to maintain the excitement. The destruction simulations were tweaked just to look good. They're not based on any mechanical analysis of material strengths."

"The bridge attack is one of the biggest cheats in the whole show," adds Knoll. "The nominal size for the Kaijus and Jaegers was around 250 feet tall, and we tried to stay around that where we could. The roadway of the Golden Gate Bridge is around 230 feet above the water, so the Kaiju in those shots is cheated up to around 700 feet tall!" [...]

Godzilla's interaction with the bridge -- despite ultimately breaking through it -- remains somewhat low-key. "In the movie, notes Bonami, "the cables are grabbed, shaken and cut. In reality if one of those cables were cut, the bridge would swing and if Godzilla were to walk thought it the effect on the bridge would be devastating. Our challenge was therefore to downplay the physics but also to try and maintain realism."

Previously, previously.


Wel.nl

Minder lezen, Meer weten.

ING: bijna de helft van de huiseigenaren stelt verduurzaming uit

AMSTERDAM (ANP) - Bijna de helft van de Nederlandse huizenbezitters wacht met het verduurzamen van hun huis door onzekerheid over het overheidsbeleid. De meeste mensen vinden dat de overheid te weinig doet om dit te stimuleren. Dat meldt ING na onderzoek naar de motivaties en belemmeringen voor het verduurzamen van woningen onder ruim 1500 huiseigenaren.

Uit de studie komt ook naar voren dat kostenbesparingen, meer wooncomfort en het klimaat de belangrijkste redenen zijn om dit te doen. Hoge kosten, een lange terugverdientijd en wisselend of onduidelijk overheidsbeleid leiden er echter toe dat sommige huizenbezitters investeringen liever uitstellen.

ING noemt het afschaffen van de salderingsregeling als voorbeeld. Via deze regeling kunnen zij zelf opgewekte stroom wegstrepen tegenover hun energieverbruik. "Bijna één op de twee huiseigenaren zou direct zonnepanelen plaatsen als de salderingsregeling volledig wordt hersteld", stelt de bank.

Van alle ondervraagden vindt 63 procent dat de overheid te weinig doet om het verduurzamen van huizen te bemoedigen. Directeur Wonen Tom Degen bij ING denkt dat de overheid verduurzaming kan versnellen door duidelijke doelen te stellen. "Als we erin slagen om meer huizen in Nederland te verduurzamen dan is dat een win-win-win voor de huizenbezitter: een waardevoller huis, lagere lasten en meer wooncomfort", licht hij toe.


Neergeschoten Iraniër werkt bij politie en is ernstig gewond

SCHOONHOVEN (ANP) - De man van Iraanse komaf die donderdagochtend is neergeschoten in Schoonhoven is een medewerker van de politie. Korpschef Janny Knol en directeur Paul van Musscher van het Politiedienstencentrum laten dat weten. De man raakte ernstig gewond. Waarom hij werd neergeschoten is niet duidelijk.

"Vanmorgen bereikte ons het vreselijke nieuws dat in Schoonhoven een politiemedewerker van Iraanse komaf is neergeschoten. Hij raakte daarbij ernstig gewond. Voor nu is de toedracht nog onduidelijk, maar dit is een grote klap", aldus Knol en Van Musscher in een gezamenlijke reactie. "In de eerste plaats voor zijn familie en naasten. Maar ook voor zijn directe collega's van de ICT-organisatie van het Politiedienstencentrum en uiteindelijk voor alle politiemedewerkers."


xiffy

Public posts from @xiffy@mastodon.nl

Dit gebeurde niet alleen in het Verenigd Koninkrijk, bij ons zijn ook veel nutsvoorzieningen verkwanseld aan 'de markt' met alle zegeningen van dien.

weownit.org.uk/privatisation